products, shoes and electronics.thehealthcaredotgov website has met the obama administration's self-imposed deadline for improvements -- that's latest word from the white house. kathleen sebellius, the secretary of health and human services, cautions users will still encounter problems during the next several months as repairs continue. by the numbers...the white house says the troubled site is now working 90% of the time --compared to 43% in october. 375-thousand people visited the site by noon monday. the president says the site it prepared to sign up 800,000 people per day. it can handle at 50,000 users at one time. reports says 100,000 applicants were processed through the federal exchange during november. bernie madoff's former right- hand-man has turned into the star witness for the prosecution against madoff's former employees. frank di-pascali was madoff's finance chief for many years. he testified yesterday against five former co-workers. those former madoff employees have pleaded innocent and claim they were tricked by their former boss. di-pascalli tells the court- madoff

in a 30 mile per hour zone. the investigation could take weeks or even months. nowthathealthcaredotgov can handle the traffic, president obama is launching a public information -- and relations -- blitz to promote participation in the health insurance exchanges. the president held an event at the white house yesterday in an effort to shift national focus towards the benefits of the new law and away from the rocky rollout of the site. republicans continue a campaign against the affordable care act. house speaker boehner calling it a government-centered health care delivery system that is fundamentally flawed. the student loan industry will soon be closely watched by the consumer financial protection bureau. the watchdog agency will now have supervisory authority over non-bank companies.the agency already oversees student loans issued by banks but most student loans are serviced by companies.. the agency will ensure that loan servicers are complying with the laws. student loan debt in the u-s tops $1.2 trillion and as many as 7 million borrowers are in default. bp may catch a bre

president compared the struggle starting up the nation'snewhealthcaresystemto the civil rights movement. now turning to sad news about one of the ultimate civil rights pioneers -- nelson mandela, an enduring world icon of peaceful resistance, has died mandela famously led south africa, out of apartheid. he spent 27 years in prison after being convicted by a white minority government. he was released in 19-90 and went on to became south africa's first black president in 1994. while in office, the economy nearly doubled. mandela died late yesterday. he was 95. friday is funday at first business. here to lighten the mood and enlighten us-- from the floor of cme group alan knuckman and scott shellady. they are ready to go for traders unplugged. good morning and topic number one: bears snared? corporate profits are at all time highs, stocks are sustaining near record levels-- are the bears growling? alan: my friend here is a market atheist.i know he doesn't believe. but if you look at the pe ratio at 19 and a half versus the record in 2000 was 26. we still have a long ways to go and

much on the bad stuff like taxes,regulations,healthcarecostsrising, but they are focusing on how they can get business done. and how they can work with their suppliers underperforming. " franz adds that high manufacturing inventory levels will likely give a boost to today's data. it's hard to get a clear view of what's happening in housing.on the up-side for sellers, prices are up. so are conventional sales, more so than distressed sales. and building permits are up in boston, new york city, san francisco, austin, houston, oklahoma city and san jose.jed kolko of trulia says this is one lagging area of the recovery that is finally starting to pick up the pace. " construction is still running at about 40% below normal levels. so this boost in new building permits is good news for one area of the housing recovery that's taken longer to recover." on the flip side, permits are down in atlanta, phoenix, las vegas, sacramento, chicago and detroit. and pending home sales are down for the fifth straight month. its deja vu all over again in a corner of the subprime lending market...though